A blog recounting the trials and tribulations of an unfit guy as he prepares to take part in the 2013 Manx Telecom Parish Walk: an 85-mile-long walk around the 17 parish churches of the Isle of Man.
Can he do it? Will he even make it to Braddan? Only time will tell...

Monday, 11 March 2013

The 2013 Prague End to End IKEA Parish Walk

Evening all! Another reasonable showing this week:

Distance (miles)

Time (hh:mm)

Energy (kcals)

Since last post (4 Mar 2013)

35.6

09:40

5689

Since records began (27 Dec 2012)

221.7

62:36

39981

Mrs W and I successfully completed a walk from one end of Prague's longest underground line to the other (hence 'End to End'). Why 'IKEA Parish Walk'? Well, there's one IKEA at either side of the city very close to each end of the underground, although I grudgingly gave in to my better half and didn't take us half a mile out of our way to touch the doors of each 'church' (or to sample their horsemeat-tainted products... although I suppose a bit of horse is better than the zero meat beef pies found in Iceland).

On our 'End to End' we covered 16.3 miles in 4h24m. Here's a route map:

Yellow line is our route, light blue line is the city boundary

Evidently the training is paying off: my legs were a bit stiff the next day, but otherwise no ill effects. Mrs W, with rather less miles under her belt, had a few blisters by the end. Still, it gave us both some confidence that, even if the Parish Walk were tomorrow, we should at least be able to make it to the first natural stopping point at Rushen (19 miles)... but (to mangle Chris Tarrant's catchphrase) we don't want to settle for that!

The weather in the last week has been great: relatively warm with plenty of clear blue skies. It certainly wasn't difficult to get out each day. After seeing snowdrops in the park I thought Spring was definitely on the way.

Spring is here... or is it? Snowdrops in Vitkov Park on Saturday.

Unfortunately I jinxed it: there was a dusting of snow overnight last night, and now we're set for at least another week of sub-zero temperatures. Oh well... after more-or-less two months of face-numbing coldness I don't think another week of it will kill me!